Muhlenberg's women's basketball team is ranked 18th in the first D3hoops.com poll.

The Mules (4-0) moved into the Top 25 after beating Gettysburg (ranked 16th at the time). The Bullets, who reached the Sweet 16 a season ago, slipped to No. 21.

Muhlenberg is the highest-ranked team from the Mid-Atlantic Region.

In the Women's Basketball Coaches Association poll, Muhlenberg is 20th.

HEFFNER GETS ANOTHER

The honors keep coming for Moravian senior Amy Heffner.

The 2007 Parkland graduate has been named the Co-ECAC Division III South Women's basketball player of the week.

Heffner poured in a career-high 30 points last week against DeSales, making it her fifth straight game in which she set career highs in points scored. She also had eight rebounds, two assists and a pair of blocked shots in 36 minutes.

Heffner, a forward, has already scored more points this season in five games (107) than she did in all of the 2009-10 season (102 points in 19 games).

I had a chance to spend a few minutes chatting with Clearfield football coach Tim Janocko on Monday night in advance of its PIAA Class 3A quarterfinal against Central Catholic on Friday night. He admitted he knew mostly about Central Catholic by the school's overall athletic reputation but did have a chance to exchange game films with Vikings coach Harold Fairclough (right). He also said he and the Bison knew what they were up against in facing Central Catholic, the consensus No. 1 Class 3A team in Pennsylvania.

He doesn't expect his players to be overcome by the moment, at least. His seniors have won 30 games and advanced to the state playoffs twice over the last three seasons. The one time they didn't reach states was last season, when they lost the District 9 final on the last play of the game.

"They’re seasoned," Janocko said. "They’ve been around. They don’t get flustered. That’s a good thing."

A few other notes on the Bison:

* Janocko said they run a spread offense, so they should be familiar with defending a team like Central Catholic.

* Their best player has been senior running back-defensive back Derek Morgan. He has 232 carries for 1,333 yards and 18 TDs. He also has 15 catches for 232 yards and 2 TDs. He had all four Bison touchdowns in their District 9 title game against Punxsutawney.

* Janocko has coached at Clearfield for 26 years, compiling a 194-93-3 record.

The Lafayette senior broke a bone in her face during the first five minutes of the team's opener against Bryant on Nov. 14 and she has been forced to wear a nose/face mask.

"They didn't find out for about a week that it was broken," she said. "And there are some blind spots."

Plus, her minutes are down. She is averaging only 14 minutes per game after playing an average of 25.3 minutes per game a season ago.

But the co-captain isn't complaining.

"I think playing with mask changes my game a little bit and my role on the team," she said. "I'm really just focusing on rebounding and being aggressive and being a spark."

THE NEW STYLE

Gone are the days of Lafayette's slow-down style.

First-year coach Dianne Nolan brought not only tons of experience with her, but also an uptempo pace, and her team is loving it.

"It's refreshing," Virgin said. "It's fun. It gives us freedom."

It also means the girls had to be dedicated to getting into even better cardiovascular shape than they had been.

No problem.

"Coach came in with this philosophy and said we had to be in better shape, and we worked at it," Virgin added. "We got here a month early --- in August. And we're in better shape than any team we've played."

FASTBREAKS:Lafayette had only 6 assists but 20 turnovers on Sunday against Fairfield. ... Eight girls played at least 16 minutes. ... The Leopards had three fastbreak points to the Stags' 10. ... Lafayette shot just 50 percent from the line in the first half, but 87.5 percent in the second half.

Northern Lehigh coach Joe Tout was happy not to be in West Catholic’s situation last week.

Coach Brian Fluck’s Burrs had a bye after winning the District 12 championship on Nov. 20, with a 34-7 win over Edward Bok Vo-Tech.

“I’m glad that we got to keep playing,” Tout said after the Bulldogs’ 50-14 rout of GAR in Friday night’s first-round state playoff game. “We got to stay in a rhythm.

“It’s tough to keep kids focused at practice when you don’t have a game.”

West Catholic’s bye was created when District 2 didn’t conduct an eight-team tournament, as was expected when the PIAA bracket was created. As a result, there was an odd number of teams for the state’s opening round.

West Catholic brings in a 10-2 record, having won nine in a row after losing two of its first three games — 23-14 to Roman Catholic in the opener and 14-7 to La Salle College in Week 3.

Since then, the Burrs have won every game by at least 20 points. They’ve outscored their last five opponents by a combined 238-40 score.

Northern Lehigh is 13-0 and a winner of the Colonial League and District 11 Class 2A titles. This is the second time the Bulldogs have won at least 13 games in one season. They did so in 2003, the only other time they made it to the state final.

La Salle is 11-1 this season and plays Easton (12-0) on Saturday in the Class 4A state quarterfinals in Philadelphia.

The winner faces the Lewisburg/Trinity winner in the following weekend’s state semifinals. Lewisburg (13-0) handed Danville its first loss, 18-13, for the District 4 title. Trinity (12-1) blanked Wyomissing 28-0 for the District 3 championship.

The PIAA football season leaves little time for celebrating Thanksgiving.

The last three days took me to Lafayette to see the latest Easton-Phillipsburg clash, to Scranton for Central Catholic’s 54-14 whipping of Abington Heights, and to Easton, where the Red Rovers again showed their toughness by rebounding from the Phillipsburg loss to beat Whitehall and repeat as District 11 Class 4A champions.

Sunday’s print and online editions of The Morning Call will have plenty on Easton’s win Saturday night. We’re using this space to wrap up the weekend.

1. Friday was as well as I’ve seen Central Catholic play this season. The Vikings were solid favorites to win their PIAA Class 3A opener against Abington Heights. Their demolition of the Comets had to cause the rest of the Class 3A teams still playing to take notice.

Central Catholic’s offensive speed, especially that of Kevin Gulyas, overwhelmed Abington Heights. The Viking defense also bottled up the Comets, with the defensive starters pitching a three-quarter shutout before heading to the bench.

I’ve covered Central Catholic 10 times in its 13 games this season, and Friday’s effort was the best I’ve seen from the Vikings. They don’t seem to have any weaknesses now, as they’ve cut down the big-play problems that hurt them earlier in the season.

The early reports I’ve heard on Clearfield, Central Catholic’s opponent in the PIAA Class 3A quarterfinals, is it may not be as good as Abington Heights. Even if Clearfield is better than the Comets, all signs point to a PIAA Class 3A semifinal between Central Catholic and Archbishop Wood. Wood first will have to get through District One champion Strath Haven.

2. Kudos to Easton again. The Red Rovers were down Thursday afternoon after Phillipsburg beat them. That game left everyone wondering how they would come out for the District 11 Class 4A final against Whitehall.

The Red Rovers again mustered the strength to win a district title while playing their third game in eight days. Their toughness and determination was best exemplified by quarterback-safety Justin Pacchioli (right) chasing down Whitehall wide receiver Tyler Artim and stripping the ball for a turnover that led to the game-winning score. I’ve covered Pacchioli a bunch between baseball season last year and football season this year, and he continues to be a great leader and winner.

Easton will be a clear underdog in its game next week against defending Class 4A state champion La Salle, but never count out a team with Easton’s toughness. The Easton-La Salle game time and site are already set, by the way. The game will take place Saturday, Dec. 4 at Northeast High in Philadelphia. Kickoff is set for 1 p.m.

3. Whitehall has to wonder what might have been. No one wants to use injuries as an excuse, but you have to wonder if Saturday’s game may have turned out differently had the Zephyrs not dropped by the bunch. They had three defensive starters – Christopher Fiore, Glen Klein and Matt Bonshak – suffer first-half injuries and then lost quarterback Chris Polony in the fourth quarter.

Polony and senior running back Eric Fiore were among the most emotional players on the field after the loss. Whitehall hadn’t been in this spot in a while, and it was a couple of plays away from advancing to states.

Pacchioli made a class move after the game in seeking out his counterpart Polony to congratulate him on his season and wish him well in the future.

What they saw was two sub-par performances by senior running back Cody Remaley.

Remaley had 103 yards and no TDs in a District 11 semifinal against Jim Thorpe, and though he scored four times against North Schuylkill the following week in the district final, he only managed 55 yards rushing.

They hardly were typical Remaley performances.

When the Grenadiers lined up against Remaley, they got what they missed during their scouting trips.

Remaley needed just 14 carries to run for 258 yards and four TDs in the Bulldogs’ 50-14 rout.

“I don’t think they saw what [Remaley] could do,” Northern Lehigh coach Joe Tout said. “He didn’t have the kind of games he usually has [against Jim Thorpe and North Schuylkill].”

Paul Wiedlich waited a long time to become a head coach at his alma mater.

Turns out, the wait was worth it.

The 1991 GAR High School graduate was an assistant there for 17 years before head coach Tony Khalife took an assistant principal’s position at the school, and thus, opened the door for Wiedlich.

All he’s done is lead the Grenadiers to the first District 2 football championship in the program’s storied history.

No one is making comparisons just yet to legendary coaches Luther Richards or John Rowlands, but it’s been a heckuva start for Wiedlich.

“Coaching is the easy part,” he admitted. “As an assistant you think you know everything the head coach has to go through, but you don’t until you have to do it. You are responsible for everything, from monitoring the players’ school work to the booster club, the parents and guardians, the entire program.

“I didn’t really know what coach [Charlie] Fick and coach Khalife went through. I do now.”

Wiedlich, who was a member of one of GAR’s Eastern Conference championship teams in 1989, takes his 11-1 team into Friday night’s PIAA Class 2A first-round game at J. Birney Crum Stadium against District 11 kingpin Northern Lehigh (12-0).

After attending Northern Lehigh’s district championship game win over North Schuyllkill, Wiedlich came away impressed with the Bulldogs.

“It’s scary,” he said. “They mimic us to a ‘T’. They have a lot of weapons. They have a lot of speed.”

Northern Lehigh coach Joe Tout, who was in junior high when GAR beat his alma mater (Panther Valley) for that 1989 EC title, has Cody Remaley, Jake Kern, Dylan Hofmann and Matt Gill, among others.

For GAR, it starts with Darrell Crawford, a junior quarterback who is as good in the classroom as he is on the field, according to Wiedlich.

“Crawford is a phenomenal person and human being,” the first-year head coach said. “He’s an ‘A’ student, a real honorable kid.

“On the field, nobody gets a good shot on him. Last year, the kids nicknamed him ‘Butter’ because of that. He slips through creases and cracks. He’s a true field general.”

Crawford has rushed for 1,228 yards and 13 touchdowns this season. He’s also thrown for 585 yards and four scores.

Similarly, Kern is slippery and elusive for Northern Lehigh out of their ‘Bulldog’ formation. He has 793 yards rushing and 13 touchdowns on just 66 touches.

Kurtis Thomas is GAR’s go-to back. The senior has 1,309 yards rushing and 19 touchdowns, despite missing 2.5 games due to an ejection and suspensions.

Not so coincidentally, GAR’s lone loss came in one of the games Thomas missed as well as its closest game being the one in which he was ejected

“The Thomas kid likes to hit things between the tackles, but he is adept at the spread offense,” Wiedlich said. “Those two kids provide great threats.”

“They give you a spread look, a trips look, a 4-wide look,” Tout said of the Grenadiers. “They are a zone blocking team. We can’t be fast to the ball. We’ve got to play our lanes.”

Northern Lehigh’s home run hitter is senior tailback Cody Remaley, who is seven rushing yards shy of 2,000 for this season. It would be the second year in a row in which he’s reached that mark. He has 6,226 career rushing yards.

Like Northern Lehigh (by Pen Argyl) in the Colonial League, GAR was pushed during the Wyoming Valley Conference regular season. There was a field goal by Steve McCann in Week 2 to help the Grenadiers escape Old Forge (9-6) and a 58-yard drive with no timeouts, no Thomas and no starting center Damon Heck to beat Hanover Area (21-20) and there was the response from the loss at Lake-Lehman.

“There’s no such thing as a good loss,” Wiedlich said. “But it was a learning tool. It humbled us. We are a young team. We have only 11 seniors.”

That is why, perhaps, GAR wasn’t expected to win its first district title this season. The club was thought to be a year away.

But Wiedlich only tinkered with Khalife’s system and the players have responded with a breakout year.

GAR has been to the district playoffs the last five years, but were just 2-5 in the district tournament since 2000 prior to this season.

“Now this team wants to be the first in GAR history to win a state playoff game,” Wiedlich said. “The kids have a certain swagger about themselves. They have that winning attitude.”

Similarly, Tout has continued to build on the tradition former coach Jim Tkach established after taking over a struggling Northern Lehigh program in 1992. After two district titles and a state runnerup finish, Tkach handed over the reins to his former assistant five years ago.

Tout, a former second-team all-state player at Panther Valley, has kept it going with a 40-17 record entering Friday night.

The Bulldogs, just like the Grenadiers, aren’t in any hurry to start the winter sports season.

“They better not be satisfied,” Tout said. “I don’t think there will be any letdown [after getting revenge against North Schuylkill in the district title game].

With several chances to play three games in eight days over the last decade, Easton football coach Steve Shiffert (left) has developed a blueprint for getting his players through Thanksgiving week.

Whitehall coach Tony Trisciani doesn't have to worry about prepping his players for a game Thursday, but simply practicing the week of Thanksgiving is a new experience for him and the Zephyrs.

How will things shake out for both teams? We won't know till Saturday night, when No. 3 Whitehall (10-2 overall) visits No. 1 Easton (11-1) in the District 11 Class 4A football final at Cottingham Stadium. Both Shiffert and Trisciani, though, are happy to be spending their holiday weeks getting prepared to play for a championship.

Shiffert, of course, first has to worry about beating rival Phillipsburg on Thursday. He didn't even want to speak about Whitehall on Tuesday afternoon with the Pburg game still ahead of him.

He did say the Red Rovers had developed “a master plan” for navigating three games in eight days. The first of those games was Friday, when they beat East Stroudsburg South 68-20.

"But you've got realize each team is different," Shiffert said. "Some teams bounce back from games a little easier than others. What we've got to do is just find the right combination of how hard we can push them on the practice field and still have them ready for games.

"[This team's] been pretty good. They came out pretty well [Monday]. We went through a normal practice routine. We'll do it again today [Tuesday], and then [Wednesday] we'll go through the pregame routine."

Trisciani said Whitehall had kept its practice structure the same as usual. The one difference is the Zephyrs have an extra day of practice thanks to playing on a Saturday night rather than a Friday.

"Thursday we're going give the kids off, and we’ll go scout Easton," Trisciani said by phone Tuesday night. "Friday will be our normal Thursday. We’re doing the same thing from a routine standpoint. We do have an extra day of rest and loading up on extra carbohydrates. They seem to be taking it in stride."

One factor worth considering is whether Whitehall’s no-huddle offense will wear on Easton’s players. The Red Rovers managed to shut down Parkland in last year’s district final to win three games in eight days, but the Trojans were a run-dominated team. Whitehall will put the ball in the air and look to make plays down the field with quarterback Chris Polony and wide receiver Tyler Artim. Easton is going to need some juice in its legs to keep up with some of the Zephyrs’ speed.

Lehigh coach Sue Troyan and seniors Erica Prosser and Kristen Dalton all made it a point during the preseason to say that 2010-11 will not be judged on whether or not its record equals or surpasses last season’s record-setting 29-4 mark.

This year’s daunting schedule makes that understandable.

Dates with defending Ivy League champion Princeton (already a home loss), LSU and No. 1-ranked UConn, to name just a few, highlight Lehigh’s challenges.

Adding to those challenges is the fact that the Mountain Hawks are searching for the right chemistry on the court. There were two holes to fill because of graduation (defensive stalwart Trisha Smith and sharpshooter Alex Ross).

Troyan remains optimistic that she’ll find that right rotation. She hopes the players keep their eyes on the real prize, of being better in two months than they are right now.

“I don’t want them to get caught up with the wins and losses,” the Lehigh coach said after Sunday’s loss to Princeton. “I want the focus to be on getting better.”

Expect a few lineup changes for the coming games this week, beginning Tuesday night at Villanova.

Troyan said Dalton likely will not start, instead being counted on to provide a spark off the bench.

“She’s more comfortable in that role,” Troyan said after Dalton didn’t score in 15 minutes as a starter against Princeton. “She’s done well [coming off the bench] in the past.”

Troyan also said she has to make room for Emily Gratch in the starting lineup after Gratch had a team-high 14 points to go along with three rebounds and three steals in 28 minutes off the bench against Princeton.

“Emily has shown consistency offensively and defensively,” Troyan said. “She’s smart defensively. She’s not as athletic as others, but she brings it at both ends.”

Troyan also is trying to see if newcomers Aly Byorick and Kelly Peterson can be reliable options, either as starters or as primary bench players.

Byorick has unlimited range. Her rust is expected after missing the last two seasons because of transfer rules and a knee injury. She had nine points in 24 minutes against Princeton.

Morning Call Sports Reporters Stephen Miller and Tom Housenick blog about high school and college sports action on and off the field in and around the Lehigh Valley, only at themorningcall.com.

Meet the bloggers

TOM HOUSENICK watches every move Lehigh’s C.J. McCollum makes on the court, laughs at every joke by Lafayette coach Fran O’Hanlon and watches all the Divisions II and III coaches and players do it for the love of the game. Basketball makes the cold weather season go by fast. Already can’t wait for late February and early March when each possession could result in a season ending or continuing on.

Wrapping up his ninth year at The Morning Call, STEPHEN MILLER is back for year No. 4 on the LVC football beat. He chronicled Central Catholic's state-championship run in 2010, watched Nazareth win its first LVC title in 2011 and saw the league crown tri-champions for the first time in 2012. He has also covered the Phillies, college football and a variety of prep sports while with The Morning Call. To stay updated on the 2013 LVC football season, check out the Varsity blog and follow him on Twitter @mcall_smiller.